More Toronto bits

Though the trip to Toronto was some time ago now (late November), I still wanted to add a few bits about it.

Dining at the legislature

Though I’ve had the full tour of Ottawa’s Parliament buildings before, I’m not sure I’d actually been to the Ontario Legislature before, but that’s where I met my sister for lunch. It’s a pretty quiet place these days, as a result of the controversial prorogation, but a very attractive old building—well worth seeing. We ate at the In Camera dining room, which has fairly luxurious atmosphere, and a varying menu with, appropriately, emphasis on local foods. All quite good at pretty reasonable prices.

Dining at Ki

Ki Restaurant has become my destination of choice for pre-concert dining, because of its highly convenient location (close to both Air Canada and Sony Centres), reliably delicious food, and excellent service. It does have a downside, though, in its large bar area being a destination of choice for the young and beautiful professionals to meet after work. It doesn’t bother us that we’re therefore seated at the back to not bring down the atmosphere, but it does make for pretty noisy dining. Something that bothers Jean in particular.

Still, at least the eating itself remained enjoyable. At Ki you order five or six small plates (for two people, that is). A bit of a challenge to pick all that out from the fairly sizable menu, but with practice we’re getting better at it. (And the wait staff are always helpful.) I no longer remember everything we had, but I do know that the seared fresh scallop with mushrooms and edamame was one of the highlights.

We also had a number of sushi and tempura inspired items, including the tempura butterfish of Alaskan king crab, salmon, butterfish, avocado, cucumber + tobiko with a tempura crust.

But the highlight, unpictured, was the creamy miso chowder drizzled with truffle oil. Just an astonishing combination of flavors.

Toronto sights

The predicted weather for this trip was terrible, but the actuality was much better: less cold, less rain than anticipated. Only late Saturday did it get pretty unpleasant, with a temperature and wind. (So then we went went home. 🙂 )

Before, though, we did have some time to amble and get some photos.

We got the above photo on the walk back from The Who concert.

And while our supposed 4-star “official Grey Cup” hotel wasn’t particularly spectacular, we were way up high and did have a beautiful view of the city outside. I love this shot.

Quadrophenia live on Grey Cup weekend

Going in, I had mixed feelings about this one.

Of course, there was no way I would miss seeing The Who performing one of my favorite albums in nearby Toronto. But despite the mostly positive reviews of the tour (the only exceptions being from those boomers who, far as I can tell, mainly resent The Who for no longer being 25), I wasn’t sure how much I would enjoy it. I thought that:

My seats at the opposite end of the stage (behind the floor seats) would not compare well with the “right in front of the stage” seats I’d had at the last two Roger Daltrey concerts.
The sound quality would be pretty crappy.
The singing quality might be kind of crappy, given how difficult Quadrophenia is to sing.

Our view of The Who stage — We weren’t exactly down front this time…

The date would also prove to throw up a few other challenges. When I bought the tickets back in July, I didn’t know that would be bringing me to downtown Toronto on Grey Cup weekend. That made for some incredibly inflated weekend hotel prices! And just a wee bit of extra traffic.

But it all turned out better than expected.

We were actually staying (without intending this at all) at the “official Grey Cup hotel.” Which, yes, it was pretty crazy with people there. But they were a bunch of really happy people! And it’s not every day you see the Winnipeg pipe band playing and marching in your hotel lobby while blue-haired Argos fans and cowboy-hatted Calgary fans look on. It was weird, and definitely seemed that my Who T-shirt was the wrong uniform to be in, but it was entertaining.

And all my concerns about the concert evaporated really quickly as well:

We weren’t close, it’s true, but we were as central as you can get, with perfect sightlines. At any time I could see all five big screens, all members of the band on stage, and if I really wanted a closer view, I had binoculars.
The sound quality wasn’t bad at all. The horns, keyboards, guitars, bass, and drums all seemed nicely mixed; it was loud enough without being too loud.
Of course some of the songs were wisely keyed lower than the original, but Roger Daltrey sang the best I’ve heard him in recent years, deftly handling the vocal jumps in “Dr. Jimmy”, singing the chorus of “Love Reign O’er Me” with impressive power and passion, and absolutely nailing the scream in “Won’t Get Fooled Again”.

The opening act

I do want to pause for a minute and acknowledge that opening act Vintage Trouble were fantastic. Led by Ty Taylor—most famous as a former contestant on Rock Star: INXS—they were energetic, engaging, and charismatic, and Ty’s signing voice remains a miraculous thing. Their half-hour set was tons of fun, and I’m going to pick up a few more of their songs. They earned a standing ovation.

Quadrophenia

As is typical, not everyone showed up for the opening act (their loss) but by the time 8:30 rolled around, that stadium looked really packed—more than I expected, really, as I didn’t think it was a sellout (and maybe it wasn’t, but it must have been close). And once again, I had that feeling that the people of Toronto really love The Who. They may have been average age 50 (I’d guess), but they were as enthusiastic as teenagers.

Another killer Who show. Toronto crowd are loud – like a home crowd. Where to next? Detroit, Minneapolis, Chicago…

— Simon Townshend (@simont40000) November 24, 2012

Apparently the original Quadrophenia tour was a bit of a mess, the band not having been given enough time to prepare for a live presentation of that complex music. The 1996/97 outing (which I have on DVD) featured a narrator telling the story of Jimmy the Mod. This one returned to another central idea of Quadrophenia: that it represented the band itself, aspects of the four very different personalities in The Who. So it was presented, sort of, as today’s Who paying tribute to their own past.

The Who before backdrop, Quadrophenia — Earlier in the show; Roger still in jacket

They played the album straight through, no narration, not even pausing to talk to the audience. But throughout, they used the five large screens behind them to either illustrate themes of the songs (a lot of water imagery—don’t see this show on a full bladder) or show scenes from that time. (Along with showing what was happening on stage, of course.) Often the scenes were of their younger selves. For example, during “The Real Me” and “Cut My Hair” were scenes of the very young mod Who at the tiny clubs they originally played at.

During “The Punk and the Godfather”, the song where Jimmy is angry that The Who have become so famous, abandoning their mod roots, the scenes were all of the band in their glory days: Pete leaping, Keith thrashing, John being cool, and Roger as the ultimate rock God. (Struck me that seeing the younger selves on the big screen while the current members sang live was the closest someone my age could possibly get to seeing The Who in their prime. And yes, I’m grateful for the experience.)

On “Helpless Dancer”, the tough guy theme, Pete and Roger traded off lines (Pete seemed to deliberately censor himself on the “lesbians and queers” line, which was interesting) while the screens showed The Who in their destructive phase, smashing their guitars, drum kits, and microphone stands, and setting off bombs.

Most notably, of course—it’s mentioned in every review—during 5:15, the live band stops at one point to allow the big projection of John Entwistle to play his famous bass solo from the Albert Hall concert in 1997. The band was really rocking at this point, and earned their first standing ovation of the night.

The Who 2012 doing 5:15 — Out of my brain on the train, on the train… 5:15

Then during “Bell Boy”, Roger handed off vocal duties to Keith Moon (video image of), just like in the old days. (Here’s video of that–not by us–also featuring the fabulous “Dr. Jimmy”, which followed.)

I have to say I found that part unexpectedly touching. I’m too young to remember when Keith Moon died; to me, in a sense, he’s always been gone, you know? So seeing this footage is the first time I can recall feeling sad about his passing.

During the instrumental “The Rock” (the only time Daltrey left the stage) the images ran through key points in history from mod days to now. The timing of the music to the 9/11 imagery was powerful and, again, very touching.

That led to the aforementioned “Love Reign O’er Me”, in which I was honestly astounded at how great Roger sounded on the chorus. I have to say that another thing about the hockey arena is that it really struck me how big and powerful his voice is, when contrasted with that of the Townshend brothers. Simon has a gorgeous, sweet-sounding voice; Pete’s has developed a bit of an odd growl in the lower ranges. But neither can fill the space in the same way.

“Love Reign O’er Me” produced the second standing ovation. (Video of that: Not from great seats, but does have great audio.) It was also the conclusion of the Quadrophenia portion of the evening.

… And more

The Quadrophenia portion was tailor-made for The Who geeks. It was not so good for more casual fans, such as my husband (who was very happy he at least had his camera with him, to keep him busy. He took 1500 photos!). So the “and more” part of the evening was especially for them. Pete Townshend finally addressed the audience, talking about how Toronto had always been a special place for the band. And then they launched into “Who Are You” over a fun backdrop, featuring, among other images, a Canadian flag (very astute of them) and the Argos logo!

Meanwhile, the smaller screens flitted between different band members. Who are you? Who, who?

“Behind Blue Eyes” followed (the crowd just stayed standing through this entire last part), and it was quite something to hear that many people singing along with every line. Then we got “Pinball Wizard“–and both Jean and I are quite surprised how well the video of that turned out, given the distance, apparent from the shaking:

What followed were the two remaining CSI themes, “Baba O’Riley” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again”. Complete with epic scream.

The very end featured just Daltrey and Townshend, on the most perfect song to end it on, “Tea and Theatre”, from Endless Wire. According to the Toronto Sun, they’d played for 2 hours 20 minutes. And gotta say, both Daltrey (who looks younger than he is) and Townshend (who does not) make growing older look a lot less scary, they had so much energy throughout, jokes about foot rubs and bed times notwithstanding! We should all be in such good shape at their age.

Rockers past their prime? Sure. But #TheWho last night at #ACC was one of the best concerts I’ve seen in years. Simply outstanding.

— Richard Budman (@shot7news) November 24, 2012

Bob Geldof and the Great Pumpkin

The timing of our Ottawa vacation was actually determined by one Sir Bob Geldof, who was doing concerts in Eastern Canada for the first time in 9 years. Perversely, I suppose, we decided to see him play at the city farthest from our own. (But really, would you rather visit Hamilton, Oshawa… or Ottawa? Right?)

Now, I’ve already produced a rather long website review of the whole concert. This post will focus on a few points that made the concert really special.

Best seats in the house

Thanks to me contacting the theatre more or less the minute tickets went on sale, we were sitting in the very centre of the very first row, which the usher declared were the “Best seats in the house!”. Certainly was nice having no blocked view of the stage whatsoever. And when Bob did stroll to the front of the stage, he was really right in front of us.

And, it wasn’t a bad vantage point for taking pictures.

Jean’s review

You know, I do bring my husband to many concerts of interest more to me. Sometimes he’s bored by them, sometimes he’s slightly mystified by them, sometimes he’s mildly entertained, and occasionally… He loves them.

At the end of this one, he had the biggest grin. His comments included:

That was really good!
He just made it so entertaining!

(I’m figuring, since he’s not the big, life-long fan, his opinion means more than mine.)

How do you think he does it? What makes him so good?

The band is large—six musicians—and highly skilled. They convey Bob’s songs extremely well.
The show, about two hours long, is very well programmed and paced. The hits interspersed amongst maybe lesser-known songs, light music to start leading to more thoughtful than to dark ones, and concluding with completely fun ones. It never lags, whether you know all the tunes or not.
Bob is a really charismatic guy, and he really gets into the songs. You can’t take your eyes off him, and there’s no way to not get caught up in his passion.
He is fascinating guy who has led (well, is leading) an incredible life. When he talks, it’s as interesting as when he sings.

Mr. Chuckles

Geldof, of course, often deals with really serious issues of world poverty and whatnot, and therefore has a reputation of being an angry, grumpy guy. And maybe he is, but he’s also really funny. And he doesn’t trot out the same old jokes each time. No, the ones we heard were definitely customized for us.

Complaints that he thought he was playing the big city of Ottawa, but instead found himself miles from nowhere, on “Little House on the Prairie”. [Centrepointe Theatre, in Nepean, kind of is in the middle of nowhere, in fact…]
Amusement that the biggest highlight of the Ottawa Market was this 900 pound pumpkin on display.
A recurring trashing of the recently visited Oshawa, a city that apparently makes even Ottawa’s “little house on the prairie” look good.

Some set highlights

Our video of Mudslide, always a favorite of mine

Hearing some Boomtown Rats songs that aren’t as famous, and that he hadn’t played on the last tour, like “When the Night Comes” and “Joey’s on the Street again”.
Getting the backstory to “Scream in Vain”, which, on record, is an odd song about yams. It had its genesis in his return to Ethiopia ten years after Live Aid, and finding lush fields where previously there was death, dust, and desert. And seeing that helped him start to get out of his own severe depression, from his wife leaving him. And then they played “Scream in Vain”, and it just came across so powerfully…
An astonishingly sexy, extended version of the lustful “Mary of Fourth Form”.

Age is just a number

Bob Geldof is 61 years old. So all these people commenting on “Oh, he looks so old, now”–well, he is old. Of course he doesn’t look 30 anymore. And, he’s just not the type to run to the Lady Clairol, so with that crazy shock of long, completely gray hair… Kind of looks like a mad professor, or something.

But his voice has lost nothing of its range and power. He can still cover that octave and a half of “I Don’t Like Mondays”, still “scream in vain” during some songs, and sing softly and gently during others. Rather nasal, it’s never been a beautiful voice, but he has sure does a lot with what he has.

He’s also very energetic during the entire show, bobbing in place at times, moving around the stage at others. He remains very lean, and apparently very fit.

And up close, with the crazy hair partly hidden under a hat, and smiling, he still looks pretty handsome.

Final tip

If you ever do go see Bob Geldof in concert—as you should, before you die—you might want to stick around after. He’s often nice enough to come out and meet with fans. Or so I hear.

More photos in SmugMug Gallery

Full review on website: Bob Geldof live in Ottawa

A capital time

Our fall trip was cut down from its usual week to a couple days (four with the weekend), but we made the most of it by leaving Friday afternoon, and staying in Ottawa until Tuesday afternoon. On both trips, we stopped for dinner in the Toronto-ish area around rush hour time, thereby successfully avoiding traffic tie-ups. The worst we experienced was just trying to get out of Kitchener Friday afternoon!

In Ottawa, we did our usuals of enjoying some of the city’s finer restaurants, visiting museums, walking around the parks, and shopping in the Market and other areas. But two things made this year’s trip specially special. The first was that we followed up on an idea from last year’s high school reunion and met up with friends there! And that was a total hoot.

The second I’ll get back to later.

When we first arrived in Ottawa, it was just the two of us for lunch. We were staying in a hotel right by the Market, so that’s where we headed. Jean recalled that we had really enjoyed Play Food and Wine last time we were in Ottawa, so we found that place again. They offer small plates, each optionally matched with a 3 or 6 oz glass of wine—two things we love (the small plates and the wine matching, that is).

I started with a nice pumpkin salad with goat cheese and cinnamon tempura (!), served with a really good red blend from Organized Crime winery (want to seek that wine out), while Jean had excellent seared trout, served with a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. My next course, pictured, was pasta with littleneck clams, served with a Gruner Veltliner (from Austria, of course). Jean had the gnochi served with sage and mushrooms, accompanied by a New Zealond Pinot Noir (Appleby Lane).

And we finished by sharing a cheese plate, me with a French muscat, while Jean had an Ontario late harvest. Everything was very good. We sat upstairs this time, and still found the atmosphere quite nice, with good service.

It had been sunny when we arrived, but started to cloud over in the afternoon. It was still pretty nice, though, so we walked around, and Jean took some photos.

Long view of Ottawa — Long view of Parliament

That night, for dinner, was our first occasion for meeting up with friends. Sylvie and Paul had driven up from Timmins that day. They had suggested we try Sidedoor. Saturday ended up being the only night that worked for that, and we couldn’t get reservations until 8:30 pm!

This turned out to be another “small plate” kind of place, but not with wine matching this time. We ordered a variety of items for sharing: fried tofu with veggies, buttered lobster tacos, tuna sashimi, sockeye salmon seviche with coconut, shrimp dumplings, pan-roasted duck, chicken in chili sauce. And steamed rice. We went with a bottle of Spanish tempranillo for the lot, and that worked pretty well.

Not sure what the drunken angle is about, but does indicate the variety of dishes being shared…

The food was, in general, very nice. Sylvie and Paul voted for the salmon and tofu as their faves; Jean and I were more inclined to the tuna and dumplings. But it was all worth eating. We didn’t order dessert, but we did all have ports to finish.

The place was… lively. It was reasonably sedate when we first arrived, but not long after, an entire wedding party showed up, and in no time, every seat in the place was filled. Mostly with people younger than us, which tends to be unusual, for your higher-end dining places. It made for conversation at our table a bit challenging; I had to fill Jean in after on some of the items Sylvie and I had discussed.

Sunday started out drizzly and was predicted to just get more rainy, so we decided this would be a good day to use our pre-purchased tickets to the Museum of Civilization. Jean had been there before, and I thought I had as well, but I soon concluded it was my first visit. It was quite interesting, especially the Canada Pavilion, where you are really immersed into Canadian history, east to west, old to new.

Native sculpture at Museum of Civilization — Part of the Native display at the museum (and cool photo)

We had lunch at the museum, and that was pretty good. I convinced Jean that a one-course lunch would suffice; I had fish, he had duck, with the matching wines (where available). And we concluded with cappuccino.

Though we had considered walking to the museum, we finally chose to drive. This proved a good decision as it was raining harder by the time we were ready to leave. So we took the car to some more distant driving locations, such as MEC, and did some shopping there before returning to the hotel.

Dinner that night was at Murray Street. We were meeting with Sylvie and Paul again, but also with MJ and Michel. (We were also supposed to meet with Jacinthe, but she had to back out due to a badly timed asthma flare up.) Where we had seen Sylvie and Paul semi-regularly over the years, this was our first extended visit with MJ and Michel in a long time. We had a great evening! Though a pretty casual spot, the sound level at Murray Street made conversation much easier than at Sidedoor, and there was much merriment over our plates and individual glasses of wine or beer.

Dining at Murray Street — We’re back to drunken angles…

Despite the one-course lunch, given that Murray Street has pretty hearty food, I decided to go with two appetizers as my meal: A Po Boy of fried oysters (don’t always like cooked oysters, but these worked), with a sparkling Ontario wine; and a B, B, and J: Beets, butter and… I don’t know what the J is, actually, but it came with fried cheese. I had a red with that. Jean had an appetizer—I don’t remember what—then, as shown in the photo foreground, the duck leg confit with lentils.

I was the only one with room left enough for dessert, which was a take-off on s’mores, with graham, chocolate mousse, and marshmallow. Very good! And, most of us had port to finish. (Apparently Jean and I are quite the port pushers.)

Monday cleared up some again. We were meeting Sylvie and Paul for lunch, so we did some walking in the morning, and Jean got a few more photos.

Lunch was at Whalesbone, on Bank. It is a seafood place in general, but especially known for oysters. It’s small, with a really cool, casual atmosphere. A good place for our final “with friends” meal.

We’d had breakfast at Dunn’s Deli again, where it’s hard to get a really small breakfast, so we weren’t starved for our 12 noon lunch. Jean decided to have just the 18 oysters, but with willingness to share with me. I went for the Nicoise salad, which Jean also helped me with. We had a half liter of a white wine he recommend, that was really good with oysters—but I can’t remember what it was. But I do remember there were three types of oysters, one from BC (the biggest and meatiest; our favorite) and two types from the East Coast. They also had a variety of dipping sauces available, including Scotch! (We still don’t like Scotch.)

Oysters at Whalesbone — The coolest picture of oysters ever!

The salad Nicoise was also very nice. Paul had that as well. Sylvie went for the fish and chips, and reported that was good. Certainly looked like it.

Monday afternoon we did a bit more Market-ing. We had an early, fairly light (and wine-less!) dinner at a Thai restaurant across from Murray Street that was perfectly fine.

And then we were off to the Bob Geldof concert. Which was the second thing that made this trip special. But I’ll report on that part separately.

More photos in the SmugMug Gallery.

Trippin’ in Elora

Not sure what was going on, but everybody and their brother seemed to be in the small town of Elora last weekend. We were there to take part in the Culinary Walking Tour, which itself seemed to have been overbooked with 19 people. During the $15 tour, you visit 7 food-related establishments for samplings, and get some history of Elora and its buildings on the way.

Town crier in Elora

Greeted by the Elora town crier

Each establishment our large group went to this day, however, seemed to be run off its feet by higher paying customers, making it difficult for them to give the tour group the normal amount of attention. This, despite the tour taking place from 2 to 4, so not exactly at peak dining hours.

Nevertheless, it was pretty enjoyable. It was a beautiful day, and we got to learn about a number of establishments we weren’t previous familiar with. This was the run down:

Olive oil and vinegar tasting at the Village Olive Grove. This was one we were quite familiar with, having twice before done tastings here. Still, it was good, with both the olive oil and vinegar (which you taste via sugar cube) being impressive, and this particular host not phased by the large group or the busyness of his shop.
Macaroons at the Mill Street Bakery and Bistro, another place we’ve actually eaten before. Macaroons were tasty, but we had to eat them standing up in the lobby while getting an abbreviated history of the building.
Bocconcini salad at the Cellar Pub and Grill. We had to wait outside here a while before they were ready for us, but that did give us time to admire their fantastic patio we’d never before noticed. The usual host for the tour was away, so the bartender did his best to introduce the place. The salad was fine, but again, we didn’t get to sit, and no one seemed to think to tell us about their menu.
E&G Fine Pastry and Cake was one place that wasn’t crowded with people, and it was a really interesting shop, full of occult books and medieval supplies along with delicious pastries. The owners didn’t say much–I don’t think English was their first language–but the mocha cake was very good.
Cork was full, so we sat out their outdoor patio. The hostess and chef still tried to give a good overview of the place as we eat a sampling of grilled salmon with side vegetable. This was on the one that intrigued us the most—more on it later (plus photo below).
At the Shepherd’s Pub, we got a small glass of MacLeans micro-brewed beer (not that they said that’s what it was, but that”s what the website says). As beer goes, it was fine, and the place seemed like your typical pub.
Finally, they managed to squeeze us in at tables Cafe Creperie and talk about that place while we sampled a piece of smoked salmon, roasted tomato, and apple crepe. They were all really good; I would recommend this place if you were in those parts and in the mood for crepes.

Our tour group was from various parts of Ontario—Toronto, London, northern Ontario—further afield than I’d expected. (I somehow thought everyone would be semi-local, like us.) And there were a couple there from Australia!

In anticipation of this, we’d skipped lunch, which maybe wasn’t the best idea, because then all the samplings seemed too small. We were actually thinking of going out for a meal by the end. But we finally nixed that idea, instead heading and just having an earlier dinner.

So in retrospect, the better idea would have been snacking before the tour. (A whole lunch might have been sampling everything difficult.)

Cork Restaurant

The exterior of Cork

This weekend Jean invited me back to Elora, where he wanted to take some pictures, then try lunch at Cork. Elora was back to its sleepy self yesterday, with just the normal number of tourists milling about. Jean wasn’t super pleased with the results of his photography (his own assessment, not mine), but post some shots anyway.

Elora Mill

Elora Mill

Elora waterway

Cool look of the water here

Ontario autumn

Ontario autumn

And, we had lunch at Cork. We tried three samplers: a brie and pear flat bread (hard to go wrong with that, and they didn’t); scallops with smoky bacon and crip chips (nice combo, big scallops); and gnocchi in cream-based sauce with cheese (very rich, but great texture on the pasta). We had that with a half-litre of unoakced Chardonnay.

Lunch at Cork

On this calmer day in Elora, we spoke to the hostess and got a better overview of their offerings, which include:

Half-price bottles of wine on Tuesday
All-you-can-eat tapas on Wednesday (Uptown 21 style, they will just keep bringing items until you declare yourself full)
$2 oysters on Thursday, with a minimum of 2 kinds on offer
Live jazz on Saturday
Something beef-related on Sunday (for those of you still eating beef. She did mention it was Ontario, not Alberta, beef)

I think we’ll be back.

African Lion Safari

Good thing people sometimes visit. Otherwise you might never your home town’s tourist attractions.

So it was that, after 22 years in the region, we finally visited African Lion Safari. Turns out it’s more than just an annoying theme song. The idea of this “zoo” is that the animals roam free, while people are kept in metal cages (also known as cars). The preserve has had good success in its breeding program for a number of endangered species.

They really do have majestic lions.

Male lion

Female lions

But the most exciting big cat encounter was with the ~~leopard~~ cheetah, who decided to walk over to our car.

Leopard approaching

And hang out right beside it.

Leopard hanging around

The ostriches, who look like living dinosaurs, pecked at the car window, hoping for food.

Ostriches

The baboons often climb on the cars, but ours didn’t prove attractive to them.

Baboons

We discovered that giraffes aren’t overly fond of rain (that it was raining for a change was amazing in itself), as they all huddled together under a shelter.

Giraffes

Rhinos are really big. Fortunately, none of them did any car-charging, that we saw.

Rhino

Some other continents were also features, such as kangaroos of Australia.

Kangaroos

And even deer of North America.

Deer at African Lion Safari

It was fun. Definitely worth a visit, if you’ve never been.

Québec City!

I don’t really have that much to say about our recent, quick visit to Québec City as all we did—apart from the concert—is what we always do there: amble about, do a little shopping, look at art, enjoy the romantic “old city” feel of the place, and eat at great restaurants. We were not bored, but it’ not much to write home about. But Jean took such great pictures there, I have to say something!

Quebec City street

Accommodations

It did strike me, this time, how we never, ever seem to stay at the same place twice when we visit. We were spotting our past hotels all over. This time out, of course, was a new one, Hotel le Grande Allée, just outside the gates of Old Quebec. Having achieved cost reductions by using travel points, it was by far the biggest room we have ever had in Québec City: It featured not only a sitting room, but two full bedrooms. Interesting, but rather more than a couple requires.

Gates to Old Quebec

Gates to Old Quebec, just down from our hotel

It was on a super-busy street, teaming with bars, cafes, and restaurants that were going strong Saturday night. So can affirm the hotel had pretty good sound proofing. Steep to park there, though.

Weather

The weekend weather could not have been better for our visit: Sunny both days, with a high around 21.

Hotel Frontenac and field

The weather, she be perfect

Food

For meals, we went to the reliable Crémaillère for dinner before the concert, and found it still had excellent service and very fine food. I shall have to contact Where to Eat in Canada to see why they don’t list it.

Sunday lunch was at a randomly selected place where I had a great platter of antipasto’s like duck pate, house-smoked salmon, roasted red peppers, prociutto, and olives. Jean had the cheese platter (no surprise).

Quebec terasse

We had lunch on a térasse something like this. (And yes, this is a photo of Jean’s)

Sunday dinner was the coolest, though, as we went to restaurant Toast!, which was entirely enjoyable. We were able to dine in their recently “open for the season” covered patio, which has a very neat atmosphere. Service was great but not stuffy, as evidenced by the staff uniform of a red plaid shirt over black pants. And their menu is just appetizers—no main courses. Which was perfect, because we weren’t starved, but everything sounded so good.

So we were able to share four: An amazing mushroom crostini; very nice asparagus and crab; le foie gras, specialty of the house; and a lamb and gnochi creation. Each with a matching glass of wine. The small serving sizes left plenty of room for dessert, which was (big surprise) chocolate for me, cheese for Jean.

Shopping

We did look at art, seriously considering one painting (which we’re still considering), but made only small-ticket purchases while there, of items such as chocolate truffles. And shoe laces. (Really.)

Street art

This piece of street art was not for sale

Students

We had two near encounters with the student protestors: we heard their pots clanging away nearby while having lunch, then after visiting the Assemblée Nationale at night. We returned to our hotel room, turned on the TV, and saw a “live” shot of protestors at the Assemblée Nationale. Meaning they must have arrived five, ten minutes after we left.

Assemblee Nationale fountain

Assemblée Nationale shortly before being overrun by student protestors

I admire their tenacity, but jeez I wish they would put it toward something actually worth fighting for!

Entertainment

Our audiobook for the journey was Sacre Bleu: A Comedy d’Art by Christopher Moore. It was the first book of his either of us had read, and we both really liked it. Very interesting weaving of all these Impressionist painters with a fantastical element. It also allowed us to great enjoyment out of lines such as “Accident. Couldn’t be helped.” and “Not that Prussian shit!”, which no one understood but us. That’s always fun.

More photos in the gallery

Southern Italy

Been quiet for me on the blogging front, as we’ve been out of country. We were on a hiking tour of the Amalfi Coast of Italy, followed by a couple days in Rome. The itinerary was as follows (each number representing a day):

Fly to Naples via Rome, on Alitalia.
Arrive and get shuttled to Bomerano. Meet the rest of the tour group and have dinner.
Hike from Bomerano to Amalfi, that has a downhill bias, involving many steps.
Ascend Monte Tre Caili, a small mountain. (On foot, of course.)
Visit the lost city of Pompeii, then climb Mount Vesuvius—the cause of its demise.
Walk through the gorgeous Valle delle Ferrie National Park (11k).
“Free day”, in which we took in a visit to Herculeum (another city lost to the Vesuvian eruption) and the lovely Ravello.
“Walk of the Gods” from Bomerano to Positano, then a boat ride back.
End of tour and train ride to Rome.
Visit Rome (museums on this day).
Continue Rome visit.
Direct flight back home.

The Amalfi Coast area is here:

Amalfi Coast map

You’ll note that the area we were staying in, Bomerano (actually part of Agerola), is not even on the map. It is up away from the sea, in the mountainous area, and not easy to get to. If not for being on a tour that brought us there, I’m sure we’d never have visited on our own.

Bomerano satellite shot

Where Bomerano is—the red A

Your transportation options are either not-terribly-frequent buses from Amalfi, spending a fortune on a taxi, or attempting to drive yourself—which would practically be a death wish on these very narrow, twisty, and busy roads. (Of course, with the tour, we either had help with the bus system or an experienced driver.)

Furthermore, there ain’t a heck of a lot to do in Bomerano. It’s quite small, not many shops, no bank, no museums (that I know of), and just a few restaurants. (Oh, and all the TV channels are in Italian.)

But as a place to collapse after a day of hiking or touring or both, it was just fine. Especially since it did have Internet, which really provided enough entertainment for the amount of time we spent there not sleeping or eating the multi-course meals. (More on that later).

The weather

The tour group the previous week had the great bad luck of experiencing a full week of cold, fog, and heavy rain. On a hiking tour.

We were in the much more fortunate position of experiencing the upswing in the weather. On the first day (of activity), the fog was heavy, so instead of climbing the mountain as would normally have been the itinerary, we did the walk down to Amalfi, eventually getting below the fog. Unfortunately, of course, we had few views on the way.

View below the fog

The view below the fog

The day of the mountain climb, though, we did have a sunny morning, and therefore nice views all the way up the mountain. However, then the fog decided to come back for our descent. And at the very bottom, we got our only rain of the trip–pretty heavy at the very end. But we all enjoyed the refuge at the Crazy Burger Cafe!

The fog rolling in

The fog rolling in at the top of the mountain

At Pompeii, the weather was fantastic. On Mount Vesuvius, the fog decided to reappear, though more in a hide and seek kind of way that did allow for some views. (A bigger issue was the strikers who prevented us from walking all the way around and partly down into the volcano, but the alternate route we did instead was a lot of fun.)

Peekaboo fog at Vesuvius

The peekaboo fog at Vesuvius

The next three days were nothing but sunny, and the final day got really warm, such that we were all discarding as many clothes as was decent, and getting a great round of sunburns.

Walk of the Gods

Perfect weather on the final hike, The Walk of the Gods

Managing the physical challenges

Though we both do some exercise, it turns out we weren’t really in shape for walking down 2700 steps one day, then climbing up a small mountain the next. By the third day, we could barely negotiate the tiny stairs in the hotel, so sore were the muscles. In my case, it was both calves (from the up) and quads (from the down).

I was actually worried about managing the rest of the trip, but by day four things were much improved, and by the end, despite continued hiking on hilly terrain, the muscles were actually pretty good.

My big toes on the other hand, got extremely whiny about the constant butting up against the end of the hiking boot, and by the end were unbelievably sensitive. That made walking in Rome the first two days something of a challenge, but that too improved in the end. Well, except that my big toe nails are now kind of black.

The group

The tour group we were with, Exodus, are British, so everyone on the tour but us were from the UK or Scotland. (We got a lot of comments about how far it was for us to come. Of course, true. They had only a 2.5 hour flight!) They ranged in age from, I’m guessing, early 30s to late 60s. And most of them in their 60s were in much better shape than us, which wasn’t embarrassing at all. 🙂

The merry band of hikers

The merry band of hikers

It was a good group. Interesting people who tended to have done a lot of traveling, and who worked in all different areas. Jean was particularly great with one of the older ladies, who had hurt her knee on the first day (!), and thereafter struggled with some of the more challenging terrain. He made sure she negotiated all the paths safely. He’s sweet, my husband.

Food and wine

We had all our breakfasts and most of dinners at Hotel Due Torri, where we staying, which is fortunately somewhat renowned for its food. It was, of course, Italian cuisine all week long, but a different menu each night, typically starting with a pasta, then following with seafood or meat, then dessert.

We also got to go into the kitchen a couple times to watch the meals being put together, which was a lot of fun. That’s a lot of olive oil in that seafood linguine! And if you have a wood-burning oven at 200 degrees, your pizza cooks in about 2 minutes.

Freshly made tiramisu

Freshly made tiramisu

The wines served were regional ones, not exported to Canada (or anywhere). They were good, quite food-friendly, but not the sort you’d make a big fuss over.

We had one night out to another Bomerano restaurant, the whole group together, and they did a fantastic job there, too. Jean and I still argue over which of us had the better meal there. And in Revello, we had a splurge lunch on a gorgeous patio. In Rome, we mostly stuck with Italian food, still. It was all good, but I think most notable was the ricotta and pear ravioli in truffle sauce. Jean liked it so much when I had it at lunch that we went back to the same place for dinner, and he ordered it.

Lunch in Revello

Lunch in Revello, “the most picturesque place on earth”, as one in our group called it

Rome

I should wind up before I’m writing all night (of course I’ll be adding more to the website, later), but not before saying something about our visit to Rome.

The first day in Rome it was 28 degrees and sunny, which you may think sounds great, but Rome is humid, I had to keep somewhat covered up due to sunburn, I had the sore feet, and so it was just uncomfortable. And then there was crowds.

We had been thinking April was still low season there, but not so much–especially late April. That first day, we walked to the Trevi Fountain, and the Spanish Steps, and the Coliseum area… And everywhere was just crawling with an unbelievable number of people.

Crowded Spanish steps

We had to share the Spanish Steps with just a few other people.

So truthfully, I wasn’t really liking Rome so much on day 1 there. (And did I mention our hotel had no air conditioning?)

Fortunately, Rome improved. It started by clouding over (but no rain) and lowering the temperature (but not getting too cold), which was much better. And, we largely avoided the big sites and saw some of the less well-known yet quite interesting areas we had missed last time:

National Museum of Rome, with fantastic ancient sculptures
Museum of Modern Art, with fantastic modern sculptures and a really neat area on optical illusion art
The Capuchin crypt, with its artful arrangement of 4000 monk bones (web photo below)
A synagogue tour, where I learned just how long Roman Jews have been persecuted
An interesting archeological site behind the synogague, unearthing another Colosseum
The lively Travestere neighborhood

Capuchin Crypt

We weren’t allowed to take photos here, so this one is a find

The not-so-well known colosseum behind the Rome synagogue

Roman Forum

And the more famous Forum (because this is a cool shot)

So Rome ended up fine as well. Thank goodness it was a second visit.

More Amalfi coast photos: http://jean-cathy.smugmug.com/Travel/2013-Travel/Italy-and-the-Amalfi-Coast/

More Rome photos: http://jean-cathy.smugmug.com/Travel/2013-Travel/Rome-April-2012/

More details (with photos): Amalfi and Rome Trip Diary

Niagara wine-ing

We did an over-nighter in Niagara-on-the-Lake last weekend. We visited Flat Rock Cellars winery for the first time, and were left somewhat unimpressed. Our favorite of the four wines we tried was the 2010 white Twisted, which is very nice. (Might make a white wine convert of you.) But it’s widely available at LCBO. And you had to buy four bottles to dispense with the tasting fee. So, we just paid the tasting fee.

More successful was our second visit to Thirteenth Street Winery, though the first at its current location. Which is very nice, with an art gallery and a bakery also on site. And they were much more relaxed about the tastings, allowing us to try more than the prescribed five. And you only needed to get two bottles to dispense with the tasting fee.

In the end we bought five: one of their nice Cabernet Rosé, two of the character-ful 2009 Gamay Noir (an interesting contrast to the fruitier 2010), and two of the Below Zero Riesling, which is that ice wine and Riesling blend.

The weather wasn’t super-cooperative on Saturday, giving us a mostly rain when we arrived in Niagara-on-the-Lake proper. We did some walking around regardless. But it was only the next morning (early, so without me) that Jean got some photos.

Building in Niagara-on-the-Lake

We had dinner at Hillebrand Estates Winery. They offered a prix fixe menu of three, four, or five courses—same menu, you just picked how many parts of it you wanted. At first I picked three that, I was then informed, didn’t include the entree course. That wasn’t ideal, but neither of the two entree options: salmon (which I’d had plenty of at lunch) and beef. But it did mention a possible vegetarian entree, so that’s what I went with: a vegetable ravioli.

Our first course was a quite delicious pumpkin soup with lobster, served with a mix of Trius Brut and ice wine. Next we had a duck and ravioli appetizer, served with a red wine—though neither of us can quite remember which grape. It seemed to go well, though. And both the duck and ravioli were very good.

Duck course

With the mains (Jean had the beef), I believe we got the Trius Red, which was fine, but nothing outstanding. We did not take the wine pairings with dessert. I had the bittersweet chocolate pudding, while Jean went for the pear meringues.

All in all, a quality meal in a lovely room with a waiter who was kind of fun—commenting on Jean’s attempt to be surreptitious about taking photos, for example.

The next day, after a nice breakfast at our B&B, and a walk around a now not-rainy Niagara-on-the-Lake, we stopped in a Peller Estates, as we curious to try their 2010 reds. But we also tried their 2010 Sauvignon Blanc, which was interesting in being a little oaked, which is unusual for that type of grape. And their Private Reserve Rosé, which we really liked.

On to the reds. The Pinot Noir wasn’t bad, but was fairly light, and didn’t seem quite worth the price tag. The Merlot was really tannic. They then realized they needed to do some extra decanting on some of these reds. After that, the Cabernet Franc wasn’t overly tannic, but it didn’t seem super-interesting, either. But the Cabernet Sauvignon was really nice. So we bought a couple bottles of that, which we’ll probably let sit a bit, along with a couple roses and one Sauvignon.

On the way back, we stopped in for lunch at Borealis Grill and Bar, which we’ve been wanting to try. It’s nothing fancy—specials of the day were perogies and ribs, for example—but it focuses on local foods, well-prepared. And we were happy with what we had, which was a fish taco in my cases (with Lake Erie pickerel) and a vegetable fusili in Jean’s—featuring pickled asparagus, goat cheese, tomato, and double smoked bacon. It’s a little out of the way from where we live, but we would go there again.

Visiting the Canyon lands

We’ve recently returned from a trip with the following itinerary:

2 days in Zion, Utah
2 days in Sedonah, Arizona
2 days in Grand Canyon Village, Arizona
2 days in Las Vegas Nevada

Map of area

(Not quite our itinerary, but gives you an idea)

Getting around: Why drive when you can walk?

We flew into Vegas, rented a car, and drove ourselves to the other locations. (And by that I mean, Jean did all the driving.) But it was still a pretty active vacation, because we managed to get some walking in on the driving days, and on the non-driving ones, we did a lot of hiking. And the thing about Canyon areas is, there a lot of uphills! So it wasn’t just ambling down paved lanes.

On Grand Canyon trail

Even in sprawling Vegas, since we abandoned the car as soon as we arrived, we got around mostly on foot.

We did use a bit of public transit, trying out the cool monorail in Vegas, and having to take the free park shuttle to get out of Springdale (the little town right outside Zion) into Zion park, and to get to the various trail heads. Grand Canyon Village also had a free shuttle, but it wasn’t as frequent or as late-running as the Zion. So we did some car-supplementing there, especially at night.

But still, pretty active. And I have to say, that does wonders for sleep. And gives you quite the appetite, too. (For food. What did you think I meant?)

We’ve discovered that quite a few people actually visit all these parks from a Las Vegas base, driving out and back in the same day. If you have limited mobility, such that hiking isn’t too feasible anyway, it’s probably a reasonable approach. The landscape is very interesting—sometimes, but not always, gorgeous—but so varied and different from here, it does make for good drives. And Las Vegas is cheaper to stay in than the other places.

Route 66 scene

Not our rental car! A view from Route 66, one of the interesting drives you can do around these parts

But our best days were definitely the hiking ones, not the car ones. So if healthy and wealthy enough to do so, I’d strongly recommend getting out of Vegas and spending non-driving time in the other places.

Trail in Zion

You can’t get here by car! (trail in Zion)

The weather outside is (not at all) frightful

The weather was perfect. It was sunny everyday. It was warm, but not too warm. Despite SP15, I even got a bit of a tan.

I’m not sure that was such great luck. It is desert area, after all; warm and sunny’s not so unusual. Still, we heard that the week before we were there, Grand Canyon had turned so frigid, they actually got some snow. And Vegas got a flash flood that left knee deep water in parts.

So maybe it wasn’t great luck, but at least some luck. (Hmm, maybe I should have tried the slots at Vegas. Oh well.)

And, we were even graced with a full moon, which apart from looking gorgeous, was helpful in those small towns which (unlike Vegas) are not very illuminated at night. Especially given that the sun set around 6:00.

Moon over Grand Canyon

Hotels: Living in the lap of luxury

This wasn’t an organized tour, so we booked all our hotels a little haphazardly, over a series of weeks. In Zion and Grand Canyon, it quickly became clear that things were selling out fast, so the main criteria became, which hotel has space? In Sedona and Las Vegas, we were able to deal-hunt more, and picked out places mostly based on value (most stars for the least money).

So we were repeatedly surprised at just how fancy the places we were staying at were. In Zion, we had a full suite with complete kitchen, a hot tub outside, and a beautiful view of the park. In Sedona, we got valet parking, porters, free yoga classes, another hot tub, and walk-in closet. It also had the most gorgeous dining area, with a view, and on the Monday night, a great guitar player performing. Really, super-romantic.

And Vegas—our cheapest accommodation—was the best room of all! Again a full suite with complete living room as well as bathroom, two flat-screen TVs, walk-in closet (of course! Too bad we were never bothering to unpack), enormous bathtub (Jean said you could get a full workout walking around in there while taking your morning shower), escort by golf cart… 9 pools (all heated)… Crazy.

The only “normal” room—a perfectly fine room of the type we normally stay in—was at Grand Canyon Village. That was the most expensive one of all.

Hell is other people: The crowds

Actually, it wasn’t that bad. But, we weren’t exactly the only people there. All accommodations in Zion/Springdale and Grand Canyon Village were fully booked. (In Utah, they post Sorry! instead of No Vacancies. Isn’t that cute?) But where Zion had some crowded buses and busy restaurants, it really wasn’t annoying. Like, we never made restaurant reservations, and that was never a problem.

But in Grand Canyon, there really were people everywhere, all the time. Really hard to get parking, most any of time of day. Really hard to get a seat at a restaurant, especially the better ones. (One we had to reserve weeks ahead, and still got only an 8:45 dining time; another we had to wait 45 minutes before being seated.) In Zion, on some trails, we hardly met anyone. Not so at Grand Canyon.

Crowd at sunset in Grand Canyon

Joining the crowd to watch the sunset at Grand Canyon

In Sedona, the trail we did was really quiet; hardly met anyone. I guess most people were visiting the little town, which was quite a bit busier. But manageable. And except for one very popular restaurant, no dining issues here, either.

Las Vegas is packed with people. Especially at night. On the streets, in the hotels, everywhere. But, great people watching, especially given the higher percentage of attractive people here (especially female, but some men as well). And of course, so many restaurants, they’re not all going to be booked.

But all in all, if this is sort of the low season, can’t imagine what it’s like in these places in the high season…

You didn’t come all this way for the food, did you?

Well, no, we didn’t. But, with the help of a few guide books, we mostly did pretty well in the dining department. It was not a big foodie focus (for once), but with about two exceptions (both in the Grand Canyon—who knew breakfast could be so dire?), all the meals ranged from decent to very good.

A real Mexican focus to the food options here, which unfortunately made us realize that we get tired of Mexican food faster than other types (despite it being better prepared there than anywhere around here). The El Tovar at Grand Canyon was touted as a five-star restaurant; I’d say that’s generous. It was good, but in local terms, I’d say it was Solé good rather than Verses good. But it was just a gorgeous place to be at; too bad it was too dark to see the view.

The beautiful restaurant at Sedona also had really good food, though with very disorganized service. Still, that benefited us one night, as they were so late bringing us the wine, we got it free! And pretty much every place we tried in Springdale was rather remarkably good.

In Las Vegas, we had supper in Paris, lunch in New York. (I just like saying that.) And back in Sedona, we did an Arizona wine tasting. I only learned on the flight over that they even made wine there. None of the restaurants seemed to serve it, but two of the whites and one of the reds were very enjoyable.

Dining in Vegas

Sorry; probably more of me than you want to see. But when in Vegas…

Leaving Las Vegas

And what did we think of Vegas, really? Worth visiting… for a day. Never seen anything like it before. But if you don’t gamble or drink your face off, it doesn’t take that long to get tired of the crowds, the noise, the smoky casinos (that all look and sound the same). And mainly what there is to do there (besides gambling and drinking your face off) is visiting big, lavish hotels and fancy designer stores. Which gets old.

But, they do have good shows. And we did get same-day discount tickets to one of those, the Cirque du Soleil Beatles Love. It was really excellent. It was compelling in itself, but I also felt it gave me new insight into the familiar Beatles music. Even at a discount, not cheap, but certainly my favorite part of Vegas.

Cirque Du Soleil at Mirage

For more photos, see http://jean-cathy.smugmug.com/Travel/Zion-Utah-Sedona-Arizona-Grand/19635036_qgqcMK#1539211510_N2cb2X3

(And Jean will be continuing to add and update that area in the coming days.)

And for a particularly detailed account of the trip: http://jean-cathy.com/cathy/photos/nevada-utah-arizona.htm

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Best seats in the house

Jean’s review

How do you think he does it? What makes him so good?

Mr. Chuckles

Some set highlights

Age is just a number

Final tip

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